Focus 5 Report: Inside the mind of Israel Keyes

Bill and Lorraine Currier were taken from their Essex home to an abandoned farmhouse nearby and murdered by confessed serial killer Israel Keyes.

"Investigators' worst fear is that you have the key to solving the case right in front of you and you ignore it or overlook it," Essex Police Lt. George Murtie said.

We took a ride with Lt. Murtie through Essex, stopping at several of the same locations Keyes did, including the Curriers' home.

"When you look at how close the houses are together the risk that he was taking in selecting that house is just phenomenal," explained Murtie.

"It seems to me that he's operating under this compulsion to do this and he also thinks he's smarter and better than everybody else so he can do this stuff and get away with it." Murtie surmised.

The last stop is 32 Upper Main Street, where the Curriers spent their final moments.

It's the site of an abandoned farmhouse that was torn down several months after they were murdered, their bodies left in the basement in garbage bags.

According to a police report, an excavator recalls a smell of death emanating from the basement. Another man also remembers a terrible smell and saw the bags in the basement but never walked down the stairs to investigate.

The home was demolished and the debris sent to a landfill in Coventry, Vt.

As investigators searched the remains of the farmhouse, many on the force were still in the dark about the Keyes confession.

"When we're excavating 32 Upper Main Street, everybody was aware that it was regarding the disappearance of the Curriers, but they were unaware of why we were doing it," Lt. Murtie explained.

When that search turned up nothing, they headed for the landfill in Coventry. After an exhaustive 11-week search, the most expensive in Vermont history, totaling more than $1 million, there was still no sign of the Curriers.

"I wish that we could have returned Bill and Lorraine's remains to their family. It didn't work out that way for any number of reasons, but there's only one person I'm holding responsible for that," Murtie added.

Murtie believes Keyes may never have confessed if he had known the farmhouse was torn down.

Keyes was being held for the murder of an Alaska barista when he began talking to investigators.

He also admitted to five other killings.

However, he did not identify those victims by name and the FBI is still searching for information in those cases.

Keyes committed suicide in his Alaskan prison cell in December 2012.

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